If the firmware is open source, backdoors can only be present in the CPU itself. That is a posibility, however with Intel backdoors can be in so many more places, plus in the CPU itself. Sounds like an improvement?
Assuming people are actually auditing the open source firmware.
Re:Talos II Lite
by ihattendorf on Tuesday May 22, 2018 @02:32PM
(#17128280)
And the pre-installed firmware hasn't been modified at all.
Is it unreasonable to generally distrust all of the big companies from the USA when it comes to security-sensitive components like for example networking and CPU?
Re:Talos II Lite
by microcolonel on Tuesday May 22, 2018 @12:51PM
(#17127352)
Why limit it to the USA? If anything the USA has the least misbehaven government among the nations where high performance chips are manufactured. I don't trust 'em wholesale, but I certainly don't trust the China any more, nor Russia, nor even Korea, Taiwan, or Japan (which I am partial to).
> Why limit it to the USA?
Threat modeling always considers the force your adversary is capable of bringing to bear against you.
If you are a US citizen, residing in the US, then the US is far more capable of capturing and throwing you into a 6'x6' steel box than the government of Russia or China.
Russia and China may very well be worse actors than FVEY, but if they can't actually get at you, then it's best to worry about who can.
The target customer is someone who doesn't want to be spied on by IME, PSP, or TrustZone, but totally trusts IBM not to collude with FVEY :)